Beer: Ratings & Reviews

650ml bottle. Brewed with Sweet Pure Honey (.ca, if you're looking it up) The honey apparently comes from Saskatchewan, for use by a south of the 49th brewery. Cool - cross-border collaboration is always welcome in my books.

This beer pours a hazy medium golden straw hue, with two fingers of tightly foamy, and damned near creamy off-white head, which leaves some nicely gnarled webbed lace around the glass as it evenly subsides.

It smells of sharply biscuity, cereal grain malt, a very faint earthy sweetness, and leafy, grassy hops. The taste is more bready, biscuity malt, some soft, grainy rye spiciness, a still rather ethereal musty, earthy sweetness, and persistent leafy, floral hops.

The carbonation is fairly mellow, the body a decent medium-light weight, just a tad watery, but generally smooth overall. It finishes off-dry - just - the prototypical ESB biscuit character thankfully holding fast, an echo of an echo of honey sweetness lingering, under the shadow of stronger leafy, earthy hops.

If you'd sold me this under the pretense of a well-bred English ESB, I could not argue one bit. However, weird circumstances prevail to nullify the proclaimed rye malt and honey additive effects to almost nil. Whatevs, I can do a mind shift as well as the next guy, especially when it pertains to my ultimate enjoyment. Look out Fullers, you have some local (heh!) competition for one of your meal tickets.